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first rising in the east at dawn (heliacal rising). With modern astronomical computers it is a relatively easy matter to demonstrate that in the Pyramid Age those 70 days were bracketed between 21 March and 1 June (Gregorian). During this period Orion was ‘invisible’ in the Duat, but the sun was not. For the latter was seen travelling through this mysterious region in daytime from a point just below the Pleiades (Right Ascension 24h 00′) to a point in front of Leo (Right Ascension 4h 30′). A further three weeks saw the heliacal rising of the star Sirius as it, too, now emerged from the tenebrous region of the underworld Duat. This takes us to 21 June, the summer solstice. The sun had now travelled to a point between the paws of Leo (Right Ascension 6h 00′). The entrance to the Duat can thus be said to be just under the Pleiades, and its exit in the paws of Leo. Let us for the moment accept that the sun temple of Ra-Horakhti at Heliopolis represents the constellation of Leo, the ‘house’ of the sun at the summer solstice. Let us also hold the thought that the three Giza pyramids may, indeed, be a representation of the three stars of Orion’s belt on the ground. Comparing sky and ground maps, we can easily see on the sky map that the sun’s position as it enters the region of the Duat is at a point just below the small cluster of stars called the Pleiades, and projecting this on to the ground map shows that it roughly corresponds to the position of the sun temples of Abu Ghorab, just ‘below’ the small cluster of Fifth Dynasty pyramids at Abusir. 75 If this is correct, then the line of sight between the sun temples of Abu Ghorab and the sun temple of Heliopolis must, by necessity, represent the ecliptic path along which the sun disc has to travel in the Duat from entrance to exit, i.e. from 21 March to 21 June, during that period when both Orion and Sirius reside in the underworld Duat - and in Pyramid Texts parlance, when Isis performs the magical rituals on Osiris (the dead king) to bring him back to life.
     
    Let us now test this hypothesis with facts and figures.
     

A Journey into the Duat
     
    Astronomers measure the apparent distances between stars in degrees known as the ‘angular distance’. Using the astronomy programme StarryNight Pro. V.4, it can be determined that the angular distance between the Pleiades and Leo is 90°, which corresponds to the distance that the sun travelled in c . 2781 BC (when the Egyptian civil calendar was established and when the master plan was probably conceived) from 21 March to 21 June, being a quarter of the full 360° yearly circuit. Now, using an official map of the region, it can be determined that the distance from Abu Ghorab to Heliopolis is 27,000 metres. In this correlative scheme, this means that 1° angular distance in the sky equals 333 metres on the ground.
     
    Let us now test this.
     
    The distance between the two outermost pyramids at Giza (Khufu and Menkaura), measured between the two extended north-west diagonals, is 928.33 metres. This represents the angular distance of the two outermost stars of Orion’s belt, Al Nitak and Mintaka, which is 2.75°. This gives 1° angular distance in the sky for 337 metres on the ground, which is within barely 2 per cent of the value established from the Abu Ghorab to Heliopolis sky-ground distances! With growing excitement I decided to test this further with the distance from the Giza pyramids to the pyramids of Abusir. This is 11,420 metres. Now the angular distance from Orion’s belt to the Pleiades is 35°. This gives 1° angular distance in the sky for 326 metres on the ground, a difference of barely 1 per cent of the value for the other sky-ground distances calculated above. 82 In view of the very close consistency of the results, I was now convinced that coincidence should be ruled out. The ancient pyramid-builders were placing their monuments according to a sky map using a 1° = 333 metres scale.